Oaktree Files $11.1 Million Loan for Kirby Gate Property

The limited liability company filed the Tennessee open end deed of trust with security agreement and assignment of rents and leases through Simmons First National Bank Nov. 1. J.R. Lewis signed the trust deed as Oaktree’s chief manager, while Richard B. Griffin II signed as its secretary and manager.

Oaktree bought the property, which is on the north side of Kirby Gate Boulevard west of Kirby Road, for $931,635 from Wills & Wills LP in a November 2012 special warranty deed. The Shelby County Assessor of Property’s 2013 appraisal is $934,300.

In late 2009, the Tennessee Health Services and Development Agency granted AmeriCare Health Properties LLC a certificate of approval to relocate 90 of its 237 nursing home beds from 3391 Old Getwell Road to a new facility it was planning on the Kirby Gate site.

Source: The Daily News Online & Chandler Reports– Daily News staff

Crosstown Team Wins Grant for Greenline Link

The Sears Crosstown redevelopment team garnered a $50,000 grant from Shelby County to help link the property with a nearby greenline.

The grant, which was given to the county from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, will be used on design work to extend the nearby Vollintine & Evergreen Greenline, located across North Parkway, through the Crosstown site.

The grant is supplemental funding for the development team’s $175 million proposal to turn the long-vacant building into a thriving hub for arts, education and health care.

The project includes St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, ALSAC (the fundraising arm of St. Jude), Crosstown Arts, Gestalt Community Schools, Memphis Teacher Residency, Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare, Church Health Center and Rhodes College as founding partners that have pledged to be tenants in the redeveloped building.

The $50,000 is not part of $15 million the redevelopment team has requested from the city of Memphis for infrastructure improvements such as sewer repairs and improving sidewalks and roads.

– Amos Maki

MAAR: Home Sales Flat in October

Memphis-area home sales for October were relatively flat from a year ago, with 1,378 total sales, according to the Memphis Area Association of Realtors.

The 1,378 sales in October were up 5.3 percent from 1,309 sales recorded in September.

The average sales price for a home in October was $146,771, up 14.2 percent from $128,526 last October. Total sales volume for the month was $202 million, up 13.7 percent from $177.9 million last October. The sales numbers come from MAAR’s Multiple Listing Service, which covers Shelby, Fayette, Tipton, Hardeman, Hardin, McNairy, and Lauderdale counties in Tennessee; DeSoto County, Miss., and Crittenden County, Ark.

MAAR has recorded 13,891 home sales through October, up 8.9 percent from 12,752 over the same period last year. The average home sales price through October was $143,200, up 10.7 percent from $129,375 over the same period last year.

– Amos Maki

Rainey Kizer Law Firm Names New President

Dale Thomas, a partner in the law firm of Rainey, Kizer, Reviere & Bell PLC, will succeed John Burleson to become the firm’s next president Jan. 1.

The firm’s president continues to practice law while also assuming responsibility for setting leadership strategy, managing business affairs and supervising the firm administrator.

Thomas has been associated with Rainey Kizer since graduating with honors from the University of Tennessee College of Law in 1988. He practices in the areas of general civil and commercial litigation, workers’ compensation, employment law, insurance coverage, trucking law, and education law.

– Andy Meek

Indie Memphis Draws More Than 10,000

The Indie Memphis Film Festival drew more than 10,000 attendees for the second year in a row to the four-day festival, organizers said.

This year’s attendance total was 10,035.

With the completion of the new Hattiloo Theatre next year, Indie Memphis executive director Erik Jambor said, the 2014 festival “should be even better.” And according to Indie Memphis board president Iddo Patt, this year’s festival had more venues at, near and sometimes over capacity than ever before.

– Andy Meek

Doctors Express Partners With Streetdog Foundation

A local medical clinic for humans has created a unique way to help “man’s best friend.”

When Doctors Express treats a patient, the medical services clinic will buy a bag of dog food in the name of that patient and donate it to the Streetdog Foundation, a nonprofit whose mission is getting pit bull breeds off the streets of Memphis and into a rehabilitation program so they can be placed into homes.

Jim Harper, owner and CEO of the Memphis Doctors Express primary and urgent care medical clinic, said Doctors Express came up with the idea for the donation program and took it to the founders of the Streetdog Foundation, which is operated by volunteers.

The program currently runs through the end of the year, but Harper said if it is successful, he will continue it next year.

– Amos Maki

Columbus Statue Moved to Marquette Park

The statue of Christopher Columbus in the Downtown park named for the explorer was moved Saturday, Nov. 9, to Marquette Park in East Memphis.

Workers hired by the Italian-American organization UNICO removed the statue Saturday morning from its pedestal on the southwest corner of Third Street and Adams Avenue, where it has stood since 1987.

After restoration work on the statue and preparation of a new pedestal, the sculpture by Archimedes A. Giacomantonio will have a new home in Marquette Park, the site of the annual Memphis Italian Festival.

The festival, which was founded after the dedication of the Columbus statue, was the impetus for UNICO leaders to petition the city to allow the statue to be moved. UNICO is paying all expenses for the relocation.

The Memphis City Council approved the removal of the statue earlier this year, along with still-tentative plans to make Columbus Park Downtown into one that honors the Memphis attorneys who were in the vanguard of the city’s civil rights movement.

The park is across Adams from the Shelby County Courthouse, where many civil rights battles played out in the 1950s and 1960s.

– Bill Dries

Amazon, Postal Service Will Deliver on Sundays

Amazon is teaming up with the U.S. Postal Service to deliver packages on Sundays.

The Seattle company says Sunday delivery will be available this week to customers in the New York and Los Angeles metropolitan areas. Amazon and the Postal Service plan to roll out service to “a large portion of the U.S. population” next year, including Dallas, Houston, New Orleans and Phoenix.

Amazon expects Sunday delivery to be popular with members of its Prime service, which costs $79 a year and comes with free two-day shipping on many items on the site as well as access to Amazon’s TV and movie streaming service. But Sunday delivery will be available to all Amazon customers.

“For Prime members, it’s free; for non-Prime members, it’s like any other delivery day of the week,” said Dave Clark, vice president of worldwide operations and customer service at Amazon. It won’t cost extra to get a package delivered on a Sunday.

Sunday delivery has been on Amazon’s wish list for a long time. The company does not disclose the percentage of its packages that are delivered on weekends, but Clark expects customers “to be delighted that they will get their products on a weekend.”

Financial terms of the arrangement were not disclosed, but the deal is likely to give the financially ailing Postal Service a boost. The agency, which lost $16 billion last year, had tried but failed to end Saturday mail delivery as a cost-saving measure.